#|| ❝ my mouth filled with the aching taste of rebirth ❞ || act iii

[rubistella]

continued

@rubistella > @fiendishfinesse > @dvilsdesire

Raphael must have sensed it– Astarion’s refusal to bow, to bend, to play Haarlep’s games. It was never outright rebellion, never so obvious as that, but the cambion did have a way of sniffing out insolence. And, in true Raphael fashion, he handled the matter personally, dolling the vampire in a jewelled collar like some prized beast. It clinked beautifully, scattered fragments of firelight from the braziers as the cambion hauled his vampiric pet across the hallway.

Not without a fight, of course.

Never without it.

“Raphael– stop! This wasn’t the agreement!” Astarion’s tenor cracked, raw with frustration. But just as his demand left him, it struck him like a freight train, the pointlessness of it all. There was ambiguity left uncovered in that contract of theirs– boundaries were never outlined. And Raphael? Well… It was only natural for the devil to take advantage of that, twist it in his favour.

No matter how loud he hissed, tugged or fought, Astarion’s strength was no match for the cambion’s. In the cruel economy of power, Raphael held all the leverage, and the pale elf’s resistance only deepened his satisfaction. 

The Boudoir’s air struck him like a slap to the face, thick and stifling… Incense hung in lazy clouds, but it did nothing to keep that fucking stench –musty sweat, rancid semen, stale blood– from assaulting the vampire’s sensitive nostrils. It curled in the back of his throat, made him gag– but Astarion’s disgust only fuelled the heat of his humiliation.

With one final yank, Raphael sent the vampire sprawling. Knees struck the stone, and his hands shot out instinctively to catch himself. Pain quickly blossomed, dull and immediate, but he barely noticed it through the rush of anger that burned in his chest. Crimsons flashed upward, only to meet the golden glow of Haarlep’s gaze.

The chain passed hands.

Astarion had gathered enough spit in his mouth – some blood too – to repudiate Haarlep when he was drawn close enough for the saliva to cling disgustingly to the incubus’ cheek, letting a hollow, tight little laugh choke its way past the collar around his throat.

“What? Here I thought you wanted to kiss me…”

Oh, the insolence… But that wouldn’t have been Astarion without it.

[rubistella]

@fiendishfinesse || continued

The laugh came sharp, slicing through the air like glass against concrete– scornful, bitter. It didn’t rise, didn’t roll out with ease. No, it tore its way free, raw and dissonant, splintering decorum in its wake. There was nothing in it but a hollow sound, the kind of laugh that devoured the space it inhabited, stripping it bare of civility.

It echoed, billowed in the air like incense, and then faded into a sneer.

“Oh yeah?” Astarion’s smirk curled. Mocking, rebellious. Defiance sat heavy on pale lips as he tested the restraints once, twice, feeling the press of Raphael’s cock against his inner thigh– a reminder of their power imbalance.

For now at least.

“I wouldn’t get ahead of myself and claim victory just yet if I were you…” He let the words linger, fester like autumnal rust. “That pet of yours I kicked out of your boudoir earlier? Harlop, was it?” Astarion had never truly bothered to learn the cunt’s name. “Wonder what he’d look like– hind up, face down, back littered with scars that won’t be so quick to heal.”

His tenor was subtle, carrying threat like a dagger drawn beneath a silk handkerchief. Meant to cut, and deep. Raphael’s possessiveness over his toys wasn’t lost on him. The prettier they were, the more obsessive the devil seemed to get.

And Raphael, of course, must've always considered himself the prettiest.

[rubistella]

@harpershigh || jah dei ate o spoiler saporra

It wasn’t often Astarion found himself slammed against a wall, lips bruised with passion. Typically, he was the one doing the shoving– orchestrating these little melodramas with all the grace of a proper maestro. But who was he to argue, really? Especially when the lips in question belonged to Jaheira, the very woman he’d spent months trying to seduce, with varying degrees of failure and success.

Oh, she’d call him insufferable, a fool, a vampire with more charm than sense. Half the time, she thought he was taking the piss, and maybe he was… in that boyhood mischief that wore Astarion so well. But this? The press of her mouth on his, the hot insistence of her tongue? There was no mockery here, no stagecraft. Astarion knew how to spot a performance, and this was nothing of the sort. If anything, it felt like a storm brewing in the horizon, a deluge of frustration and something darker, perhaps even sweeter, spilling out into that kiss.

When Jaheira finally pulled away, Astarion blinked, dazed. Lips curved into a languid, wolfish smile that promised nothing good for anyone’s reputation. “Did they now?” Breathless, there was a rasp to his voice.

The half-elf might’ve thought that was the end of it. A kiss for the sake of appearances, the guards satisfied with their ruse. But no… that wouldn’t do. Not for Astarion, creature of excess, of indulgence. He didn’t care about the performance— he cared about her lips, her breath, the way she’d given him a taste and thought that would suffice.

His arm snaked around her waist, pulling her close enough that their hips slotted, his movements quick and possessive. The other hand rose to cradle her jaw, his fingers grazing her cheek, guiding her with infuriating delicacy. “Oh, no,” his breath brushed cold against her lips, so warm and kiss-bruised. “We’re not finished here.”

And then he kissed her again— harder, deeper, the kind of kiss that left no room for retreat.

[rubistella]

@bakrahispul || is dealing with blood-drunk vampire cat bf

"did you see the look on his face?" astarion clung to his lover's trunk of an arm, blood-drunk and a bit woozy with every step faltering and his only saving grace the fact he had keeping his own balance down to a science. "he looked positively hideous." an inebriated peal of hoarse laughter escaped him. perhaps the most genuine he'd let out ever since their arrival. "i mean, most of us do during the stroke of death. but to watch all that stalwart confidence crumble to absolute dread? mwah!"

let alone the fact they had just saved a pair of brats from their captors. astarion was far more concerned about the look in said captors' eyes than the brats themselves, whom halsin had insisted they delivered home only to find that the kids didn't have a home to return to.

a pity.

finding themselves a secluded spot under a towering willow in the heart of bloomridge park, astarion waited for halsin to settle down first before nestling himself between the druid's legs and easing back against him. evidence of their little murderous excursion still clung to his chin in a trickle of blood astarion had yet to do away with.

"you know," his smile grew, hand coming down to pluck a starflower off by the stem and hold it up to his nose, picking it apart petal by petal. "if i had known that being such a bloody do-gooder could inspire so much horror in the hearts of those we're putting to sword, why i might even have started sooner myself." a chuckle, more breath than sound. the flower in his hold only one-third ruined. "honestly, i could do without all of the grandiose displays of gratitude thrown my way by the peasantry. now, the gory deaths that precede them?" throwing his head back against the druid's chest, the pale elf's fangs bared in display of a rampant laugh. "hah! tease me any harder with that sort of vicious delight, my love, and you might as well end up inside of me by the night's end."

doing good and astarion didn't exactly come as a package deal.

...unless, of course, encouraged by the prospect of murder and feasting on the blood of thinking creatures, in which case he could be persuaded.

[rubistella]

“Even those we thought beyond saving have, in fact, changed... in their own way.” Astarion’s thumbs worked over the tension knotted across the wizard’s back, smoothing out all that burdened weight of Caleb’s wingspan. Lips brushed the slope where neck met shoulder, a fleeting kiss that carried more tenderness than bite for once. “Maybe not as drastically as some.” He whispered against the skin with a chuckle, wet and warm.

Astarion couldn’t see himself turning into a paragon of goodness— not now, not ever. But at the very least he’d learned to care. To love. Even if his affections were rare and guarded, reserved for one and only. 

The world be damned.

“And you, my dear?” Curiosity peaked in every note smoothed over by the vampire’s tenor. “In what ways has this little adventure of ours changed you?”

Not that the old bitterness was gone. Caleb’s secrets still gnawed at him, stubbornly lingering in his mind’s eye. But Astarion was trying not to dwell... He always found it easier to temper hubris when conversation carried a note of sentiment– when his hands, running a luffa across Caleb’s arms, could distract him with the glow of warm skin, the rhythm of pulsing blood so delicious close to his fangs that they ached.

It was enough, for now, to quiet the rancor.

Caleb happily leaned into Astarion's touch, a soft sigh escaping his lips as those skilled fingers worked the tension from his muscles. The vampire's hands were a paradox, both cool and soothing against his travel-weary skin, yet igniting a familiar heat deep within him. It was a sensation he had come to crave, a balm to the constant ache in his soul.

"I seek… repentance, Astarion. But my idea of what that looks like has changed since meeting you all. I have changed." The words were heavy on Caleb's tongue, weighted with the gravity of his realization.

For so long, he had been driven by a singular goal—to undo his past mistakes, to erase the sins that stained his hands. But now, with these new bonds forged in the crucible of their shared struggles, he found himself questioning the path he had set for himself. "I thought repentance meant solitude, meant punishing myself for my transgressions. But now…" He trailed off, gaze growing distant as he lost himself in thought.

"Now I am starting to wonder if perhaps true repentance lies in trying to do better, in using what power I have to help others and make some small difference in this world."

It was a daunting prospect, one that went against every instinct ingrained in him by years of self-loathing and guilt. But there was a flicker of something akin to hope kindling in his chest. "I still want to end that… man, badly. But more than anything I don’t any other children to be used as I was."

No more children on the pyre.

[rubistella]

@harpershigh || continued

Astarion looked like a man caught in a trance. Wide-eyed, unblinking, and with that crackerjack smirk growing slow– a dangerous little invitation, all lips and no mercy. To watch her, to move toward Jaheira only to feel her resistance, was torment measured in increments too small for mortal comprehension. He wanted her, yes, but it wasn’t a want born of hunger alone. It was obsession. The kind that swallowed all reason and replaced it with a map of desire, charted in unholy cravings.

He would touch her. He would claim her. He would kiss her in places no one else had dared, map her skin with his tongue as if every freckle, scar and stretch mark held secrets he alone was entitled to learn. He wanted to sink his fangs into the corded strength of her muscles, to drink her life as though it were a vintage wine, aged in battles and tempered by time.

I want to possess you.

Once the back of Astarion’s knees met the mattress, he caved in and collapsed back, but reaction came quick as he propped his upper half on forearms, watching her like a prey caught in its worship. Those deep set crimsons caging all light trailed over Jaheira with a reverence that bordered on blasphemy. She wasn’t just another hunt... She was divinity. The way he looked at her was the closest thing to worship Astarion could muster in his undead existence.

In a fluid motion, his hands rose to the laces of his shirt, ties unraveling under a swift, almost impatient set of fingers. The fabric slipped free, cast aside without a second thought, baring skin that shimmered like polished marble under candlelight— pale, cool, and so impossibly smooth. Against the heat of Baldur’s Gate, his touch would be a respite, a chill that promised ruin. Like a serpent, he moved with purpose, stealing the warmth of the living and transmuting it into sin.

Cold hands found Jaheira’s hips and fingers sunk into the firm flesh of her buttocks like she and her body belonged to him. Astarion hauled her closer, dragging her into his orbit, into the gravity of his intent. Dipping his head low, nose brushed the curve of her navel, the sharp intake of her breath telling him everything he needed to know. Lower still, he let the scent of her anticipation, of her excitement consume him, an earthy scent of a female in heat– alive in ways a vampire like him could never be.

A tongue darted out, tentative only in the way it sought for precision. He found her through the fabric, teasing with a slow, deliberate drag, eyes never leaving hers. Crimsons burned, equal parts challenge and hunger. Then his teeth caught the waistband of her undergarments, a feral smile curling around the tension. With a jerk, the fabric tore, exposing her to him.

Jaheira, even in her older years, was a vision of the divine.

Astarion paused for a second, if only to savour the moment, a predator not yet striking but ready. He was always ready.

[rubistella]

@fiendishfinesse || continued (we have self-control in the negatives)

Every kiss burned like the strike of a forge hammer, molten glass pressed against cold skin. Had Raphael’s lips always carried this sting, or was it only now, with the weight of understanding, that Astarion felt their heat? And the fiend’s words, oh how softly he sang them, were threads spun from an achingly familiar role. A play, yes— one Astarion had been the star and shadow of both, casting nets of desire to pull hapless souls into the spiral of his master’s hunger. Butterflies drawn to his light, only to be devoured by a greater purpose.

Another’s purpose at that.

At first, instinct bent him. Pale throat arched, a yielding curve as if inviting the fiend’s mouth to find his pulse, to claim his skin. But then, like a blade striking flint, memory ignited, sharp… unforgiving. Astarion’s hand rose, pressing lightly against Raphael’s chest, not with conviction, but enough to carve a breath of distance between them. Not enough to sever. Not enough to keep him fully away.

Raphael rarely heeded boundaries; it was in his nature to trespass.

“I don’t mind doing this with you.” There was an undercurrent to all that silky sweetness in his voice that ran taut as a bowstring. Firm. He then paused, crimsons faltering, falling to the rich buttons of the devil’s doublet. Slim fingers toyed with them, a distraction, albeit small, served well to aid him in gathering his thoughts. “That much, I believe, is clear.”

The air hung heavy between them, gilded in silence for a spell until… “But using my body to lead others into ruin so they’ll crawl to you as their last salvation?” Crimsons rose to lock on the molten gold of Raphael’s gaze. Fire met fire. “It reeks of Cazador,” Astarion’s tenor turned into a knife honed by memory. “And all the things he made me do.”

[rubistella]

@bearlydruid || continued from x (plotted)

Astarion’s pitch-black humour was coloured by intrigue when the druid claimed him to himself not long ago. There he thought Halsin wasn’t the type to hold things too close, much less be possessive. But here they were, seated on a tapestry laid out on a balcony which overlooked the ocean, sharing space in a way that didn’t invite anyone else in. Not the bard making eyes at him back in the tavern, or the barmaid wiping down the same tables repeatedly, always hovering nearby.

“You’re just full of surprises, aren’t you?” Appreciative. A secret smile tugged at the vampire's mouth while he twirled a little star flower just shy of his nose. The same one he'd pressed to the druid's lips earlier. An ode to their first kiss.

Halsin’s heartbeat, once quickened by his earlier territorial impulses, had now slowed into a steady rhythm. Each pulse soothed and sang, lulling the pale elf into a rare state of contentment. It almost tempted Astarion to carve the organ out of his chest, keep it as a token somewhere near…

A shame it would stop beating if he did that.

“Oh? Do you like them?” Pale brows perked up a little, less-than-half innocent while his fingers toyed with that blossom still. It was no secret the vampire spent an hour each day preening his curls to perfection. Good thing elves didn’t need much sleep, or he’d be losing daylight over vanity. “I’ve always wondered what it’s like to have hair like yours... It seems so effortless.” There was a tinge of envy somewhere in there.

Pushing his head back against Halsin’s broad chest, Astarion let a pinchful of those burnt-blond strands cascade over an index and slip through his fingers. “Not that I mind taking care of my own hair.” Toeing the line between playful and malicious, the vampire tugged a little at that stray braid. “But the absence of a reflection certainly doesn’t make the job any easier.” And then he tugged harder, enough to send a message— just not the one you'd say out loud.

“So...” Intrigue slithered itself into the drawl of his tenor and crimsons narrowed to pin the druid's eyes under the scrutiny of their prying stare. Their weight akin to daggers finding a tender spot to sink into. “Are we going to talk about what happened back in the tavern, or are we just pretending that wasn't a thing?”

[rubistella]

“Oh, you must mean all the pretty things that live, don't you?” A soft scoff ensued, all sharp fanged and bitter amusement. “Because I, my dear, walk among the dead—if that somehow managed to slip your notice.”

Rolling his eyes as impatience’s first primal sign, Astarion’s stare found those healing waters. They rippled around his calves, so beautiful… so comforting. It almost felt like a mirage in a place like this. He wondered, privately, if it had been designed to heal those left broken after a few of Haarlep’s more… savage indulgences.

“Well,” Astarion straightened his spine in square-shouldered poise. “I am hoping to carve out some semblance of hierarchy here. One where I answer to no one but the master of the house, of course.”

Favorite plaything—or whatever wretched nonsense Haarlep had called it—suited his interests just fine if it meant being on top. Pale brows perked up as he watched the crumbled petals mend themselves upon touching the water. Such fragile, resilient things… Not unlike the ruined souls of the damned meant to be soothed here.

“About that,” Stance shifted as it grew more lax, slightly less reserved once Astarion leaned back to rest on his elbows. Robe coming apart just enough to expose part of his chest, just shy of a nipple. “If I’m to do the deed with you, darling, I’d much prefer you wear your own face. That is… if you can even remember what it looks like.” A challenge.

To be a shapeshifter often meant to lose the individual in favour of being everyone else.

Oh all sorts of things, Haarlep would gain. Company, fun, laughter, Astarion's suffering, of course. How delicious that would be. Sex was good, too, and the sensation of another body that pressed against Haarlep's. He was given visitors from time to time, when Raphael allowed it, but he enjoyed a new flavour. He would also boast to the master of the house, if he could have it. Remind Raphael of his place beneath him on the bed, and how much pleasure he could give to others as he took their glamour--and some of their souls.

This soul, however... was already accounted for. Unfortunately, Haarlep could not dine on it.

"The satisfaction of your displeasure certainly brings me great joy," the incubus teased in response, voice a low, breathy whisper between the two of them now that they were so close. Astarion was still inside the waters, and Haarlep crouched on the edge of the fountain. His fingers idly drew into the rose petals that floated on top to create such a romantic and pleasing atmosphere. But the boudoir was truly filled with carnal instinct, blood, sweat and tears.

"All pretty things wither in the Hells, my dear," he replied, plucking one of the petals. In his fingers, he rubbed them, where they turned to ash and fell back into the water.

"How long will you last, I wonder? Until Raphael's talons have you by that delicate, vampire bitten throat of yours." He chuckled lowly, a rumble in his chest that sounded much like Raphael's. "Or will you become a favourite possession, where your bloom may continue to grace the House of Hope? Raphael does love his property, so long as it serves him well."

Haarlep pushed himself up to his hind legs, his stance still that of a proud peacock, shoulders back and chin held high, eyes bright like embers as he looked down to the vampire. He could have kicked him from where they stood, could have pressed his head under the water with the padding of his foot. He did not, though. Astarion would know suffering soon enough under Raphael's iron fist.

"Your glamour would make a wonderful addition, I do admit, sweet thing. But you are not yet ready to vow it, so I will wait patiently. Your company, for now, will sate my curiosity."

He smiled down at the vampire. "And I am curious. Would you prefer a different outfit I wear? Perhaps a different face even? Does this one make you uneasy? Seeing your new master in his beautiful youth?"

[rubistella]

@fiendishfinesse || and our 10k threads

“Tempting.” Astarion’s tongue grazed the pointy end of a fang as Raphael’s touch lingered. Sensations deepened, the slow rise of awareness. Was Raphael doing something with his infernal powers again? Eyelids drew into slits. The devil never did bother to ask for permission, not when mischief was within arm’s reach.

“But why ruin the surprise?” Astarion’s voice turned. Intimate… provocative. “I imagine you won’t allow anyone else the pleasure of being my first, once it happens.”

A sly grin tugged at his lips. How amusing it would be, to afford someone else with the opportunity just to watch Raphael bristle, to keep him on his toes a little.

Now that would rile him up nicely, wouldn’t it?

“Unless…” Astarion pivoted, all feline fluidity and satin arrogance, back pressing flush against the devil's chest. Palms, cold to the touch, roamed down the length of his master's arms, coaxing them around his slender frame, folding him into an embrace. His shoulders curled a little in an almost demure display. Almost. “What if your pet slipped the leash?” Soothing tenor teased into a whisper, sultry, suggestive. “What if he played with someone else, tasted them before you ever got the chance to indulge in his newfound… abilities?” Tilting his head back, lips ghosted over Raphael’s ear and mischief reintroduced itself to those ravishing rubies Astarion had for eyes. “Wouldn’t that be a shame?”

[rubistella]

@fiendishfinesse || continued x

As always, Astarion fought against every instinct screaming for retreat, muscles wound with the effort to remain still, to keep himself from flinching when the fiend’s infernal fingers grazed his own, heat from the touch scorching against his arctic skin.

“Forgive me,” the vampire began, sarcasm dripping from his words as if designed to corrode, “but after two centuries with nothing to my name but the clothes on my back, selfless acts of kindness are rather difficult to believe.” His lips curled into a smile that lacked all sense of humour. A fitting look for a vampire. “Still, I suppose I could make the effort.” Lies had never landed more obvious before. Though Astarion was practiced in the art of deception, each word delivered with a smoothness he’d perfected over decades, he didn’t bother to mask the mendacity behind them.

With granted permission, the pale elf unsheathed his blades, metal scrape against leather echoed through the room before they hit the floor, abandoned without a glance. His brand new daggers gleamed viciously, the velvet-lined box tossed aside with equal disregard. “Give me your hand.” Should the devil refuse to comply, Astarion would see that he took the hand himself, fingers deft as he sliced across Raphael’s lifeline to watch the blood well up, dark and viscous. And just like that, the blade soaked up the fluid and a significant growth in Astarion’s strength was registered.

It didn’t take rocket science to piece together the rest.

Fucker got his hands on a vampiric weapon somehow.

“Raphael…” Soft but barbed, Astarion's eyes narrowed. There was a pause, a stretch of silence that ran like a blade mid-foreplay held just above the skin. Rhapsody itself never looked this deadly, this beautiful. “…where did you get this?”

Astarion’s stare rose to meet the cambion's. Every syllable stretched to suspicion.

[rubistella]

"Do you realize, Astarion, that every smile you grant another feels like a theft from me? A theft so profound it demands retribution.

You are mine, and if I must rend and flail a thousand souls, reducing them to ash and screams, to carve my claim upon you, so be it."

( ♡ )

@fiendishfinesse || devil wants to stake his claim ❤️

Devils, Astarion found, loved obsessively. It was in their nature— all hunger and claws. Raphael’s appreciation was no different, as twisted and suffocating as it was. To want was to possess, to hold so tightly it bordered on destruction. That was how Raphael loved: a thing to be consumed, devoured, made entirely his.

Why, then, did his master insist that Astarion use his body this way? In charm and seduction, dancing around sex with the same ease he lied, to bind contractors– to keep them close. Effective, yes, but contradictory all at once. Raphael’s jealousies burned bright enough to char. Perhaps that was the point? Perhaps the anger thrilled him. A convenient excuse to display his affections in… less than ideal ways.

A lazy smirk pulled along the vampire’s lips.

Was this about the contractors, or… the cambions, perhaps? Objects of the vampire’s own self-destructive tendencies of entertainment during Raphael’s absences, long nights of boredom filling the empty spaces. 

Astarion had to wonder if Raphael was angrier about the indolence, or the distraction.

“Oh... Whatever you are talking about?” Astarion’s voice was a cherry bite, a burst of flavour to sweeten the mood and smooth out any wrinkled anger. His laugh that followed, so flippant, casual and joyous, only added to the sentiment. “Gods, you’re obsessed, aren't you?” Appreciative. Because Astarion, too, only knew love when obsession was involved.

Casual steps brought him closer, his hands, cold and true, found purchase on the cambion’s waist and hauled him near, slotting their loins together. Raphael’s human form was pleasant in the way humans normally were– soft at the edges, easy to bruise.

His mother must have been a gorgeous woman.

“What’s eating at you, hm?” Leaning a little closer, Astarion brushed his lips just shy of Raphael’s. It wasn’t a kiss, no… but the way he spoke, how cold breath would scatter over Raphael’s mouth when he did it, was the closest to teasing into intimacy without actually delivering it that the vampire could have gotten. “Talk to me, my love…” Bury your secrets in my skin…“I know something’s been bothering you.”

[rubistella]

“So, you’re telling me that all this time, you could’ve been human while we—” Astarion’s words trailed off, caught somewhere between disbelief and betrayal. A tongue darted over ivories, lingering on the cusp of a smirk that was cold, bitter. The kind of smile you’d expect from someone who found irony in tragedy. He let out a chuckle, more breath than sound, folding arms across his chest like he needed something to hold onto. Even if himself.

That story about his wife, his daughter, her demise? In the grand scheme, it felt small now, insignificant. There was something else gnawing at him, something that had been brewing in the back of his thoughts.

“Why didn’t you do it?” Astarion’s eyes narrowed into slits, voice a dagger’s edge but quiet. The kind of quiet that could cut. “Have you any idea how much easier that would’ve made things for us? For me?”

And there it was. The elephant in the room.

"I was. Yes. I was a priest of Lathander back in my days. Centuries ago. I ran a small church out of one of many close by towns. I was a married man. Had a wife, and a five year old daughter. We had quite the trouble conceiving. But I suppose knowing that what I truly am, which is was an aberrant parasite living in the body of a human, it made sense why it was hard."

There's some seconds of silence. Solemness to it all. It all feels like yesterday, and for Connor, it was. He was alive one second, and then dead the next, with his town nothing but rubble. Centuries slipped by while for him, it only felt like he'd blinked.

"As for your second question, I can do better than any mere illusion magic. I can create flesh. I can alter myself, physically. Often, however, I choose not to. It feels disingenuous to lie to people about what I am. But I do often tire of people running after me with pitchforks and torches."

[rubistella]

@bearlydruid is enabling the angst || continued

A battleground of scars, blooming into bruises, cuts only half-healed. Halsin’s body was a map of violence, an archive of pain etched into flesh. Astarion’s eyes drifted over him, not with empathy… never that. But he'd grown close enough to the archdruid to feel something. A lot sharper, more possessive too. Fondness? Perhaps. But not before the urge to destroy whatever had dared to break this man. Not as sweet, but murderous.

He might have been the one to stab Orin more times than deemed necessary. Pale hands still shook from it. And it was there, back in Bhaal's unholy temple, that the ghost of his former master crawled beneath his skin, tightened his throat, stole his breath away.

Astarion was sure he’d felt something tremble in his own voice at the time. He was half-hoping Halsin had been too lost in his stupor during the whole thing to take notice. Half-hoping he had not.

The vampire couldn't simply make up his goddamn mind, could he?

“Is it alright if I sit?” That came softer than intended, carrying the weight of someone too familiar with a grim hand dealt by fate. Because Astarion knew the look of a man haunted when he saw one, the way trauma settled in… made a home where it did not belong. Festered. At least here, in the Elfsong Tavern's safety, there was hope that nobody would target the druid... If anything, they'd might as well come for Astarion first. Whoever "they" were. “Or I could leave you to it… if that’s what you prefer. I merely thought you could use the company.”

[rubistella]

(you can only have the cambion if you fix his fashion sense. or at least make him stop wearing the ruff.)

@driftingjazzbard || unprompted

“I know… It’s hideous, isn’t it?” Rich with disdain, the vampire’s stare lingered on @fiendishfinesse's garish doublet... A crime against fashion. Even at a distance, it offended him— red silk catching the light like blood spilled in vain, gold trim screaming wealth without taste. 

As a rogue, he knew exactly what that silk cost, could weigh its worth in coin with a thief’s precision, tally up the hours it took to spin, dye, and weave it into something so utterly repugnant. But as a person? Oh, how he hated it. Hated it with a deep, unreasonable passion.

“Oh, but I assure you,” a sly smile tugged at his lips, garnets gleaming with something too vicious to be written off as mere mirth. “He looks far better undressed. There’s no greater delight than tearing those ghastly things off him…” Astarion sighed then, wistful, as if recalling some cherished tragedy. “Such a shame, really, that Raphael always insists on buying replacements. Or worse,” tenor dripped with contempt, “fixing them with one of his little spells. Hm…”

Trailing off with a purr as he eyed the cambion from a distance, Astarion already calculated the next thread to pull loose once they were alone in a room again– or in the devil’s study, for all he gave a damn about it.

[rubistella]

@dvilsdesire || continued

There was a strange elegance to the absurd, an almost painful beauty that radiated from one so singular such as Harleep. A youth so luminous it seemed stolen, hoarded in the hollows of his bizarre form. It was the kind of beauty that vampires might covet, not for sustenance, but due to the creature of envy that resided within them. Astarion knew but one truth about him: Harleep was an incubus, a token given to their master by some infernal patriarch, a precious little gift meant to beguile. A creature of endless appetite, bound not by flesh’s fatigue, but thriving in the endless spirals of pleasure’s intoxicating maze.

And now, those golden eyes —honeyed fire, feral sunrise— studied him with a predator’s leisure, peeling away layers of silk and poise. Undressing him without touch, without shame too. Oh, how unnervingly familiar it was, that stare. Like gazing into Raphael’s mirror, yet finding a reflection too flawed in its mimicry’s perfection. Harleep was not his master, not quite, and therein lay the dissonance that crawled under Astarion’s skin.

“Should I find reason for concern in that?” The vampire’s hands drew satin folds tighter around his body, as though they might shield him from the incubus’s predatory allure. Astarion’s expression sharpened into a thin veneer of disdain as cover for the unease roiling behind those ice cold eyes. “Your status here matters little to me, for I answer to one man alone. And you, little fiend, are no master of mine. Washed-up scraps of infernal favour hold no sway over me in this place.”

It was true. His pact was sealed with Raphael, the ink of that contract soaked deep into the marrow of his soul. Harleep might preen and prowl, but Astarion owed nothing to him, and even less to the lesser servants that scurried about in their master’s shadow. Still, the incubus’s smile seemed to linger, unfazed, a teasing thing that stretched across his face like an arrow’s pointy end, promising trouble in the shape of cruel pleasures and crueler intent.